Sleep
I picture myself, two or three years from now. By then he’ll be walking, he’ll be having conversations and making very basic jokes. He’ll be in and around the age to start school, we’ll be in a different country. And I’ll be far enough removed from it that I can casually throw out the story to people who are having babies, or having problems with them, with the wise eyes of experience. He was like that, I’d say. He would go to bed around seven, and by ten or half ten, he would wake, shrieking like he’d seen how the world ends. He would be unconsoleable. He would have to be fed, or held down, and cleaned off as he leaked fluids out of his eyes, nose and mouth while continuing to just shriek. And then he’d go quiet. And I wouldn’t sleep at that point, I would go on standby. Waiting for the next one. Sometimes it was at two, sometimes three. He would wake again and his throat would rattle with the force of his rage, eyes still closed. He would continue for an hour, picked up, put down, cleaned up, cleaned out, changed, soothed, wept over, he would continue and continue and continue and then it would end again and I could go back onto standby. It would happen again. If we were unlucky, the hour would begin with five. If we were lucky, seven. He might go on and off for a while but eventually he would be up and clean and so happy, too happy to be mad at, not even aware of what he’d done, and then it’s the beginning of the day and all the things that have to be done have only started. But at least that was a couple of years ago, I’d conclude. Whoever I’m talking to will nod sagely and hope they have it a little better.